Topics - Matt Gibbs

Hi guys this is my first time on the cloudy nights site so welkome to you all .its a big ask as my celestron nexstar + 93989 hand control has popped a component on the pcb its in the u6 position and it is marked up as ae8,it would be great if someone with a greater knowlage of celestron to help me find the part specifics and part number.many thanks in advance.Andy.

Down in the 'observatories' page, there is a thread going by a gent who is building an octagonal observatory, and in that discussion, cutting plywood panels has come up, and I thought that posting an easy-to-build way to cut sheet stock easily and inexpensively wanted its own thread.

Cutting sheet stock safely and accurately, particularly starting with full sheets, is, as most of you already know, always difficult for folks with limited tooling, or even with most homeowner/hobby table saws, because lifting, supporting, and controlling a full sheet requires about 5 hands at once.

For those with a lot of cutting to do, and those for whom a several-hundred-dollar purchase is easy to justify, there are several brands of saw systems called 'track-saws' that utilize a specially-designed circular saw that runs in a track, they allow a user to lay a sheet on a flat surface, set the saw rig on top, and cut a very straight line. These setups also allow cuts like triangles and trapezoids, which are close-to-impossible on a table saw, but common in the world of ATM.

For those of us who only do this once in a while, here's an easy and inexpensive saw guide to build that works nearly as well as the 'downtown' models:

This guide is built with a couple of pieces of 1/4 or 3/8 plywood or masonite, and takes only minutes to complete. the system will work with circular saws, routers, and jigsaws, you only need to build the guide to fit the intended tool. To build one, first cut a factory-edge strip about 2" wide off a sheet of ply, then cut another strip perhaps 8" wide. These cuts don't have to be really straight, cutting freehand along a line is plenty good enough.

Measure the base of your saw, and determine the dimension from the wide side of the base to the blade, and mark the wider strip maybe 1/2" wider. Fasten the narrow strip with the factory edge (which is normally very straight) to the wider, with that edge facing the saw width, with some wood glue, and a few temporary nails or screws to hold it until the glue sets.

When it is set up, put the guide on something you can cut into a bit, clamp or tack it into place so it won't move, set your saw so the blade projects a bit deeper than the guide thickness, and holding the saw snugly against the factory edge of the narrow strip, cut through the wider piece, leaving a finished cut that is the same width as the bottom of your saw.

You now have a guide that you can lay this cut edge right on the line you want to cut in your sheet, clamp or tack in place, run the saw along it, and have a straight and even finished edge.

Four things to consider..... your saw may hit the upper strip if the blade is set all the way out, you may need to raise the motor a bit. Some inexpensive saws are not accurately aligned, so the blade and base edge are not really parallel, you can measure at the front and back edge of the blade to check. A good carbide blade with more teeth will give a cleaner cut than a standard 'framing' blade used to cut 2x4's and the like.You want to be sure that when you cut your stock, that it doesn't sag during the cut, which can pinch the saw and possibly cause it to kick backward, which scares the heck out of you, and normally ruins your guide and your work piece.

For each of my saws, I have built both an 8' and a 4' guide, for use depending on the project and cut length.

Here are a couple of photos to show you the guide with a saw on it. (the photos are a bit fuzzy, but you'll get the idea.....)

What would make a good evergreen Cedar or other 6-10 foot tree to plant that doesn't grown too wide. This to block some right side neighbor light. Left side is an all cedar type of barrier, perhaps I should just plant that same type? It's quite wide though. The backside is all forest but some stray light 10 foot high, coming through from some lamp post far away.Also it can range from -40 to +40 celsius in Southern Canada on top of New York State depending on the season, so definitely no delicate trees.What is a good Evergreen or Cedar tree to plant?

I wanted to see if anyone else had some experience to share regarding the calibration of the AP RAPAS right angle polar scope.I understand there is a novel method of adjusting the scope using three (3) push-pull screws to adjust the orientation of the scope and wanted to see if anyone had any suggestions, information, etc.. . to share. (i.e. lessons learned)

NOTE: So, just to quickly do this out of the way, I have no clue if that would work or not please don't assume I am stupid, I just had a mad idea.

I had an idea just a little while back which I want to talk with everybody else and get their thoughts, a telescope having an adjustable focal length, this might seem crazy and there would be many obstaclesto barrier like focusing and ease of use but it may be fun to consider. To begin with, before one or more one of these challenges are met, the premise, take a design such as the AWB OneSky as our base OTA, the sole principal modificationto the OTA itself would be creating quitting points for the truss tubes to adjust the focal length. But if we were to to utilize the supplied mirror we using this modified setup we would run intoour first difficulty, focus, my sole notion to have the ability to conquer this would be to get rid of glass altogetherand get a differentreflectiveand FLEXIBLE material such as Mylar, this setup would allow one to change the curvature of the primary material which would now have the ability to come into focus with the secondary, adjusting this material would be quite straightforward, an individual would just turn a nob at the bottom of the OTA to pull down the center of the material or return it to normal, changing the curvature. So, in the long run, we have a telescope, using adjustabletruss tube ceases, and a main material which has an adjustablecurvature, allowing the telescopeto still focus correctly. There's still the issue of ease of use to cope with but an extremely detailed manual along with a comfy main adjusting nob would probably fix this. This mad and most likely impossiblebrain child of mine would allow for one, state 20mm eyepiece to become a 25mm or 15mm eyepiece, allowing for a high-quality eyepiece to basically equal many. So, what are everybody'sthoughts on this, is that just some stupid idea to get a jack of all trades range, or have I stumbled upon an idea here, has anyone else pondered it? If so, what were your ideas and have you got any hints for me?

New ES 26mm came yesterday, as well Morpheus 14mm which wanted to test.In test I added some of my Zeiss 25mm Aspheirc orthos, also as well Lunt 100 deg epcs.

All items were tested alone and in binoviewers, in my OO 8" f/6 newt.

Results in summary:

***Morpheus + APM 2.7x barlow vs Lunt 5mm: Lunt definetly provide flatter celebrities across FOV, particularly on edges, with more contrast. Morpheus barlowed appears provide less flatter celebrities in heart, and stars appears to be larger using warmer clour vs Lunt! Morpheus have significantly more eye releaf which I like more, but Lunt isnt bad at all for me who dont wear eyeglasses. Obviously, Lunt have much more larger FOV. IMO, Lunt mechanis and optic finish is better than Morpheus.Morpheus alone is not so sharp on edges as I hoped, even in my f/6 newt, without using Paracorr.Morpheus have nice large eye lens and it appears somewhat better in life than in pictures.They're excellent for binoviewers because lengthy eye releaf and big FOV, and eyepeices appears to dissapear like RKE 28mm once rubber eyeguards are removed.

***Zeiss 25mm vs ES 26mm: Zeiss possess superiory smaller stars, neutral tone vs ES, bit smaller FOV, and ES is not so sharp across FOV like I hoped!More nebulosity can be seen with Zeiss, and pict appears to be more "clean".ES are excellent bino pairs, really comfortable, more comfortable in eye releaf term vs ES 24mm 68 deg, and are not so fat and heavy since ES 24mm 68 deg.1 thing I'd like that ES dont possess suchtapered barell that I find consistently to ben't so usefull.Attached Thumbnails